"Our Turkish partners have announced that they are using Ukrainian engines to produce Bayraktars. We are going to buy more [Bayraktars] next year. But I point out that will be Ukrainian Bayraktars. They will be produced in Turkey but they will be Ukrainian ones, in service of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. They will be used because we must protect our independence, also in line with Article 51 of the UN Charter", Reznikov said late Friday, as quoted by the Ukrainian Defence Ministry.
The chief commander of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Valerii Zaluzhnyi, said, in turn, that the army was permanently ready to use the Bayraktar drones in Donbass.
Last month, the Ukrainian General Staff claimed that the military had destroyed an enemy howitzer with a guided bomb launched via a Bayraktar strike drone in Donbass. Under the Minsk agreements, only the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe's mission is allowed to use drones in Donbass.